The 2017 Annual School Leader’s Tour of China a great success!

Over the April school holidays the Confucius Institute along with our partners in Shandong held our annual trip for school principals and school leaders.

Over a 12 day program, school leaders from South Australia visited the cities of Shanghai, Weifang, Qingdao, Qufu, Jinan and Beijing, making important connections with several Chinese schools and participating in a broad program that allowed information sharing, cultural exchange, school visits, and academic forums.

Included in the program was the 7th China-Australia Principal’s Forum, this year renamed as the International Principal’s forum, with teachers from England, France and Japan joining an expanded format with almost 500 delegates. This forum was a great opportunity for cooperation, collaboration and information exchange between Chinese school leaders and their international counterparts.

This year close to 500 delegates attended the principal’s forum in Weifang

Other highlights of the tour included home visits, helping to create personal connections to go along with the institutional connections already established, and the early stages of the establishment of a number of new sister-school relationships. Including the signing of a memorandum of understanding between Weifang Foreign Languages School and St, Marks College to pursue a friendly schools relationship.

Greeting Chinese Students

Since 2007 the Confucius Institute has organised 15 tours to China, both for school principals and for teachers, helping to establish 9 sister school relationships and counting. We are already looking forward to next years trip in 2018!

It wasn’t all hard work, some principals even found some time to play soccer